ALEXA and the electric Rolls Royce

The new Rolls Royce costs just £0.02 ($0.03) per mile to run. But don't get the wrong impression, Rolls Royce is not going down market; the prototype 102EX Phantom Experimental Electric model, shown this March at the Geneva Motor Show, costs an estimated £1 million, or $1.64 million. It may feature the novelty of an electric engine, but this car is absolutely part of the Rolls Royce tradition: like every other model in the marque's history, it is the height of luxury, the personification of power and the preserve of a discerning customer.

ALEXA shoots the electric Phantom

Made with the intention of sparking debate about the concept of an electrically powered luxury car, this marketing video for the Rolls Royce 102EX Phantom utilized the ARRI ALEXA for studio shots.

Award-winning agency Partners Andrews Aldridge was tasked with marketing the new concept vehicle and generating debate about the car. Reflecting the coming together of tradition with technology, the campaign combined old media in the form of the expo and new media through the use of streaming video and social media.

The video piece created to showcase the car fuses the modernity of internet communications with the timeless quality of broadcast production values.

The ALEXA is very user-friendly and totally reliable.

Producer Shaun Dyos

Producer Shaun Dyos selected the ARRI ALEXA to film the studio shots: "VMI showed me the quality of the pictures the camera could produce and I was instantly sold," he says. "Here was a camera that could do the new Phantom justice."

Lit by acclaimed DoP Kulbir Thandi, directed by Clive Parsley of Partners Andrews Aldridge and shot by cameraman Gerard Botha, the video was produced in a single week.

Links >>

"The ALEXA is very user-friendly and totally reliable," comments Dyos. "We wasted no time setting up the camera or trouble-shooting; it seemed so straightforward to capture the pictures."

Recording to SxS cards, the files were transferred to Avid Nitris for postproduction. "Again," continues Dyos, "recording to QuickTime means that ingest into the Avid was fast and flawless. The ALEXA is also great from a workflow perspective."